rubberman

Yes - that looks dire. But you never know on the run in. There are always a few mad results - beat Southampton and on-the-beach Palace on the last day and scrape a draw somewhere (hopefully not this weekend) may be enough. Doubt it though.

How long is his contract? I'm hoping about 20 years at this point.

Southampton and Forest pretty much done now looking at their remaining games. Too tough to call the final spot. Hope it goes to the final day with 5 or 6 still in the mix. Will make for great viewing from up top.

God this is fun. As others have said, shades of our promotion run. The togetherness of the players is something I wasn't expecting from an Emery squad but seeing a team that is once again greater than the sum of its parts and at the same time seeing individual players upping their game is such a delight. Can only imagine how good it is for the youngsters who are getting involved with the first team as well. Loving it.

5th? Nine points behind, worse GD and Man U have a game in hand. Plus they play Brentford tonight who we can catch, so need them to at least draw or win. I love what we're doing, but 5th ain't going to happen - sorry to piss on your chips.

Obviously everyone is entitled to their own view, but how you can only feel 'average' about this season with the extraordinary change in fortune since Emery came in is frankly incredible. We've been in CL form for pretty much half a season now since binning the fraud.

Emery's Villa now. Leicester are shite, 2 nil win, 3 more points and finally into positive goal difference.

Still pretty sure 8th is our ceiling for this season, but that's incredible in itself. I'll still be delighted with anything in the top half, so it's all gravy. But a couple more wins this week and who knows where we might be - haven't felt this optimistic about the club since the MO'N days. For all the stop-start this season (and maybe because of that) it is an extraordinary season so far. Relegation battle is getting really tense (and a joy to watch from above). Winners and CL places still completely unknown and everyone else fighting for the last European places. Into April and not a single team has nothing to play for - don't think that's been the case before.

Yes - definitely. It's the type of thing we would be caught out by, but pretty confident Unai will have analysed the **** out of it. Comfortable 2-0 win and up to 10th for a few minutes, before remaining in 11th forever.

1-3 Ings to get one of course. Ollie to get back to form after his barren patch (game) with a couple + one from little Emi.

No way we're getting 7th. Probably 11th, maybe 10th and highly unlikely 9th. Brighton, Brentford and Liverpool all have 4/5 points on us, better gd and games in hand. We can fight it out with Chelsea (and hope they keep Potter) and pray the one of the teams above collapses, but anything better is for the birds.

I hope they do. Alongside Southampton, Bournemouth, Leeds and West Ham. (possibly a bit greedy to hope for a rule change to 5 teams relegated)

That makes me slightly less annoyed, but he still needs to cut it out. Those few seconds really don't help.

Exactly as expected. They were niggling to play against and took a while to break down, but comfortable in the end. We needed the creativity of little Emi and you could see us growing back in confidence. Downsides - big Emi getting another time wasting card and it's still really nerve-wracking watching them play out from the back.

We only have to look at the other keepers we've signed in the last 10 years to know what a good thing we have with Emi.

Exactly. Reading this thread, I think the only player no-one has mentioned getting rid of is Kamara. We won't (and shouldn't) do a Forest/Chelsea this summer. A few significant additions (and then a couple of current first team move to back up) and 1 or 2 young prospects, I'd be fine with, .

I'm kind of fine either way. He'll only go if we get seriously big money and presumably if Unai thinks he's not going to fill the role he wants from a keeper - there's no reason to sell otherwise. If he stays, he's still the best keeper we've had in years and is right in his peak years. I still think he and the coaches should be able to keep improving his distribution from the back and with a couple of upgrades around him we'll get better in playing that way. But, please, please, please cut out the time wasting and yellow cards.

Blimey. A bit depressing in here. Straightforward win for me. 0-2.

Doesn't sound like the boss was too happy with Emi going up for the final corner. Don't think we'll see that happening again!

Disappointing result but played really well at times. I think we'll be back to a decent run now those last 2 games have gone. Still positive overall - you can see the improvement coming, albeit slowly.

Sounds like Mings will be back and Bertie on the bench. Would love one of Bert's specials in the last few minutes of the game.

It was a clear pen. Don't really see there's any dispute.

Sure. Apart from the 2 we did get. Let's not throw everything out the pram after losing to the (2nd) best side in the league. We'll have another good run this season after these couple of games and this summer will significantly strengthen.

Sadly a fairly predictable result. We turned up when they had switched off. Start Moreno and Duran next game, and let's fervently hope Mings is back. See if we can scrape through the arsenal game and then get back on it.

I still think we're going to get something from this. (for another 28 minutes or so).